Ansel Adams: A Biography


Mary Street Alinder - 1996
    Here, Mary Street Alinder--who collaborated with Adams on his memoir and was his assistant in later life--is not reticent about the major emotional episodes in Adams's life, including his marriage and extramarital affairs, and his not-altogether-successful fatherhood. She explores the major artistic influences on his work and gives in-depth profiles of the significant figures in his circle. She also explains the technique and style Adams developed to obtain his unique vision, as well as his uneasiness at becoming a commodity. Ansel Adams: A Biography is an intimate and provocative portrait of the world's most famous photographer.

Super Late Bloomer: My Early Days in Transition


Julia Kaye - 2018
    So when she began her gender transition in 2016, she decided to use her popular webcomic, Up and Out, to process her journey and help others with similar struggles realize they weren’t alone. Julia’s poignant, relatable comics honestly depict her personal ups and downs while dealing with the various issues involved in transitioning—from struggling with self-acceptance and challenging societal expectations, to moments of self-love and joy. Super Late Bloomer both educates and inspires, as Julia faces her difficulties head-on and commits to being wholly, authentically who she was always meant to be

Harry Potter Page to Screen: The Complete Filmmaking Journey


Bob McCabe - 2011
    Rowling's acclaimed novels to cinematic life. Developed in collaboration with the creative team behind the celebrated movie series, this deluxe, 500-plus page compendium features exclusive stories from the cast and crew, hundreds of never-before-seen photographs and concept illustrations sourced from the closed film sets, and rare memorabilia. As the definitive look at the magic that made cinematic history, "Page to Screen" is the ultimate collectible, perfect for Muggles everywhere.

Chicana Lesbians: The Girls Our Mothers Warned Us About


Carla Trujillo - 1991
    LGBT Studies. "CHICANA LESBIANS is a love poem, a bible, a dictionary, nothing so simple as a manifesto--this book is yet another reason to believe--to believe in the girls our mothers warned us about, brown girls, lesbians, making their own love poems, bibles, dictionaries, manifestoes, reasons to believe."--Dorothy Allison"When I was selling books at a Chicana conference, I noticed book buyers were literally afraid to touch this anthology. I say now what I said then, 'Don't be scared. Sexuality is not contagious, but ignorance is.' If you've ever been curious, been there, been voyeur, been tourist, or just plain under-informed, misinformed, or unaffirmed, here is a book to listen to and learn from."--Sandra Cisneros

Fireheart Tiger


Aliette de Bodard - 2021
    Now she’s returned to her mother’s imperial court, haunted not only by memories of her first romance, but by worrying magical echoes of a fire that devastated Ephteria’s royal palace.Thanh’s new role as a diplomat places her once again in the path of her first love, the powerful and magnetic Eldris of Ephteria, who knows exactly what she wants: romance from Thanh and much more from Thanh’s home. Eldris won’t take no for an answer, on either front. But the fire that burned down one palace is tempting Thanh with the possibility of making her own dangerous decisions.Can Thanh find the freedom to shape her country’s fate—and her own?

¡Hola Papi!: How to Come Out in a Walmart Parking Lot and Other Life Lessons


John Paul Brammer - 2021
    At first, it was flattering; JP took this as white-guy speak for “hey, handsome.” Who doesn’t want to be called handsome? But then it happened again and again…and again, leaving JP wondering: Who the hell is Papi?What started as a racialized moniker given to him on a hookup app soon became the inspiration for his now wildly popular advice column “¡Hola Papi!,” launching his career as the Cheryl Strayed for young queer people everywhere—and some straight people too. JP had his doubts at first—what advice could he really offer while he himself stumbled through his early 20s? Sometimes the best advice to dole outcomes from looking within, which is what JP has done in his column and book—and readers have flocked to him for honest, heartfelt wisdom, and of course, a few laughs.In ¡Hola Papi!, JP shares his story of growing up biracial and in the closet in America’s heartland, while attempting to answer some of life’s toughest questions: How do I let go of the past? How do I become the person I want to be? Is there such a thing as being too gay? Should I hook up with my grade school bully now that he’s out of the closet? Questions we’ve all asked ourselves, surely.¡Hola Papi! is for anyone—gay, straight, and everything in between—who has ever taken stock of their unique place in the world.

Bulletproof


Maci Bookout - 2015
    But then she got pregnant, and everything turned upside down. Even as she rose to fame on MTV's hit series Teen Mom, Maci was struggling to balance life as a single teen mom with her own hopes and dreams...all while honoring her own sense of independence. This is the true story of how she took charge of the unexpected to build a life for herself and her son Bentley, and managed not to go crazy in the process. Because sometimes growing up is an act of will...and Maci's will is bulletproof.

Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison: The Making of a Masterpiece


Michael Streissguth - 2004
    The concert and the live album, Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison, propelled him to worldwide superstardom. He reached new audiences, ignited tremendous growth in the country music industry, and connected with fans in a way no other artist has before or since.Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison is a riveting account of that day, what led to it, and what came after. Scrupulously researched, rich with the author's unprecedented access to Folsom Prison's and Columbia Records' archives, illustrated with more than 100 photos, Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison shows how Johnny Cash forever became a champion of the downtrodden, as well as one of the more enduring forces in American music.

Last Words from Montmartre


Qiu Miaojin - 1996
    Unfolding through a series of letters written by an unnamed narrator, Last Words tells the story of a passionate relationship between two young women—their sexual awakening, their gradual breakup, and the devastating aftermath of their broken love. In a style that veers between extremes, from self-deprecation to pathos, compulsive repetition to rhapsodic musings, reticence to vulnerability, Qiu’s genre-bending novel is at once a psychological thriller, a sublime romance, and the author’s own suicide note.The letters (which, Qiu tells us, can be read in any order) leap between Paris, Taipei, and Tokyo. They display wrenching insights into what it means to live between cultures, languages, and genders—until the genderless character Zoë appears, and the narrator’s spiritual and physical identity is transformed. As powerfully raw and transcendent as Mishima’s Confessions of a Mask, Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther, and Theresa Cha’s Dictée, to name but a few, Last Words from Montmartre proves Qiu Miaojin to be one of the finest experimentalists and modernist Chinese-language writers of our generation.

Femme in Public


Alok Vaid-Menon - 2017
    Femme In Public (2017) is a collection of poetry by nonbinary artist Alok Vaid-Menon. In the author's words it "is a dream of what it could look like to celebrate transfemininity in public – both in ourselves and for the people who desire us (by which I mean: everyone, across time, always)."

Lady Gaga


Terry Richardson - 2011
    During the time period he followed Gaga, Richardson took over 100,000 images and attended more than 30 Monster Ball dates around the world. From the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards to the Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal rally in Portland, Maine, to the Thierry Mugler show at Maxime, Paris, Richardson captures Lady Gaga as you've never seen her before. A year-long global odyssey- -all access, nothing off limits--this is the book Lady Gaga fans have been waiting for.

Females


Andrea Long Chu - 2019
    What one does with this desire is what we call gender." So begins Andrea Long Chu's investigation into gender and desire, females and bodies, radical dreams and philosophical pessimism, and feminism as a form of political suicide. Feminism, Chu argues, is an untenable claim, and "when you make an untenable claim, your desire is showing, like a shy tattoo peeking out from a sleeve." Written in a series of linked theses, this is a provocative and searching text from our most exciting new public intellectual, a self described "sad trans girl in Brooklyn." Chu wears her heart on her sleeve with wit, style, and a manic searching grace.

The Body Is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love


Sonya Renee Taylor - 2018
    Systems of oppression thrive off our inability to make peace with difference and injure the relationship we have with our own bodies.The Body Is Not an Apology offers radical self-love as the balm to heal the wounds inflicted by these violent systems. World-renowned activist and poet Sonya Renee Taylor invites us to reconnect with the radical origins of our minds and bodies and celebrate our collective, enduring strength. As we awaken to our own indoctrinated body shame, we feel inspired to awaken others and to interrupt the systems that perpetuate body shame and oppression against all bodies. When we act from this truth on a global scale, we usher in the transformative opportunity of radical self-love, which is the opportunity for a more just, equitable, and compassionate world--for us all.

No Modernism Without Lesbians


Diana Souhami - 2020
    The portraits there, large and imposing, were of women: Ida Rubinstein, Una Troubridge, Gluck, Elisabeth de Gramont, Renata Borgatti, Bryher. Romaine's lover Natalie Barney said that Paris had been 'the Sapphic Centre of the Western World', and these women defined it. Capote himself called them 'the all-time ultimate gallery of famous dykes'. This book is about that gallery and celebrates the central role they played in the cultural revolution that was Modernism.Modernism happened in Paris, and these women were Paris. Shocking, free, blatant, they weren't just expats. They'd grouped together to create their own world, far from the restrictions of home. They were talented, often well-off, and lesbian. They answered to no one but themselves. Among them, for example, was Sylvia Beach, the American who set up the legendary Shakespeare & Co in 1919 and published Joyce's Ulysses when nobody else dared to, as well as Radclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness which was burned in Britain. The shop became the unofficial meeting place of the Modernists. Gertrude Stein, Beach's friend, bought the work of her friends – Matisse, Cézanne, Picasso, Gauguin – when they were young and unknown. Hemingway, Scott Fitzerald, Paul Bowles and others gravitated to the shop and to the world around these women.Told in the spirit of Stein's Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, or Hemingway's A Moveable Feast, this book is as colourful and exuberant as the women themselves.

Grace's Guide: The Art of Pretending to Be a Grown-up


Grace Helbig - 2014
    Well, maybe there are harder things in life…but being an adult is difficult! So Grace Helbig has written a guide that’s perfect for anyone who is faced with the daunting task of becoming an adult.Infused with her trademark saucy, sweet, and funny voice, Grace’s Guide is a tongue-in-cheek handbook for millennials, encompassing everything a young or new (or regular or old) adult needs to know, from surviving a breakup to recovering from a hangover. Beautifully illustrated and full-color, Grace’s Guide features interactive elements and exclusive stories from Grace’s own misadventures—like losing her virginity solely because her date took her to a Macaroni Grill—and many other hilarious lessons she learned the hard way.Amusing and unexpectedly educational, this refreshing and colorful guide proves that becoming an adult doesn’t necessarily mean you have to grow up.